A second-grader in Arizona who suffers from ADHD was duct-taped to her chair after getting up to sharpen her pencil too often.
Kentucky school officials placed a 9-year-old autistic student in a duffel bag as a punishment acting up in class. Turns out, it wasn't the first time the boy had been placed inside the "therapy bag."
An 11-year-old special needs student had his hands cuffed behind his back and was driven home in a police car after refusing to come inside after recess and acting in an out of control manner by "passively" resisting police officers.
Unfortunately, these are far from isolated incidents.
According to a ProPublica investigative report, such harsh punishments are part of a widespread phenomenon plaguing school districts across the country. "Most [incidents] of restraints and seclusions happen to kids with disabilities--and are more likely to happen to kids with autism or emotional/behavioral problems."
In 2012 alone, there were more than 267,000 attempts by school officials to restrain or lock up students using straps, bungee cords, and duct tape.
At least 500 students are placed in "Scream Rooms" every day (there were 104,000 reported uses of scream rooms in a given year). For those unfamiliar with the term, a "scream room" is an isolated, unmonitored, locked room--sometimes padded, often as small as four-feet-by-four-feet--which school officials use to place students in seclusion. As psychiatrist Keith Albow points out, "Scream rooms are nothing but solitary confinement, and by extension, that makes every school that uses them a prison. They turn principals into wardens and make every student an inmate."
Schools acting like prisons. School officials acting like wardens. Students treated like inmates and punished like hardened criminals.
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